Nearly a year after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, former President Donald Trump is offering his clearest stance yet on the hot-button social issue.
The presumptive 2024 GOP nominee released a short video on Truth Social Monday morning discussing his position on “abortion and abortion rights.” The spark notes version: He believes abortion laws are up to the states.
On Monday’s show, Megyn was joined by Stu Burguiere, host of BlazeTV’s Stu Does America, and Dave Marcus, columnist for The Daily Mail and Fox News, to discuss Trump’s announcement and what it could mean for the 2024 election.
Trump’s Abortion Policy
Ahead of the video drop on Monday, Trump teased on Truth Social over the weekend that he would be putting out a “statement on abortion and abortion rights.” The former president explained in the initial post that he believes the Republican Party needs to strike a balance in order to respect life and win elections.
“I will be putting out my statement on Abortion and Abortion Rights tomorrow morning. Republicans, and all others, must follow their hearts and minds, but remember that, like Ronald Reagan before me, I, and most other Republicans, believe in EXCEPTIONS for Rape, Incest, and Life of the Mother. Great love and compassion must be shown when even thinking about the subject of LIFE, but at the same time we must use common sense in realizing that we have an obligation to the salvation of our Nation, which is currently in serious DECLINE, TO WIN ELECTIONS, without which we will have nothing other than failure, death, and destruction. We will not let that happen. We will, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
– Donald Trump, April 7, 2024
In the four-and-a-half-minute clip that followed on Monday morning, Trump emphasized that the GOP, under his leadership, will “always support the creation of strong, thriving, and healthy American families.”
He said he was “proudly the person responsible for the ending of something that all legal scholars – both sides – wanted and, in fact, demanded be ended” in Roe v. Wade. Trump then suggested Democrats “are the radical ones” on this issue because they “support abortion up to and even beyond the ninth month.”
He then offered his stance on how abortion law should be handled:
“My view is now that we have abortion where everybody wanted it from a legal standpoint, the states will determine by vote or legislation or, perhaps, both and whatever they decide must be the law of the land. In this case, the law of the state.
Many states will be different… At the end of the day, this is all about the will of the people. You must follow your heart or, in many cases, your religion or your faith…
I want to thank the six justices – Chief Justice John Roberts, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Brett Kavanaugh, Amy Coney Barrett, and Neil Gorsuch… for having the courage to allow this long-term, hard-fought battle to finally end. This 50-year battle over Roe v. Wade took it out of the federal hands and brought it into the hearts, minds, and votes of the people in each state. It was really something. Now it’s up to the states to do the right thing…”
The forty-fifth president also said that he joins the “overwhelming majority of Republicans, conservatives, Christians, and pro-life Americans” in “strongly” supporting the availability of in–vitro fertilization treatments “for couples who are trying to have a precocious baby.”
‘He Is Thinking Strategically’
While the corporate media and left are dissecting every aspect of the Trump video, Megyn said there was very little new information in the clip. “I don’t really see any change in Trump’s positions – he’s never been some diehard social conservative,” she explained. “We’ve talked about whether the Republicans need to get more realistic on their messaging, if they want to win elections and that seems to be where Trump landed,”
The fact that Trump is facing criticism from both sides of the aisle in the wake of the announcement, Megyn noted, actually may be a signal that he was able to “thread the needle” on the controversial issue. “He is getting blowback from the left and the right on this, which probably means he is doing it right,” she said.
Despite not supporting abortion, both Burguiere and Marcus found Trump’s messaging to be “pragmatic” – at least politically. “I think it’s an appropriate, pragmatic statement for the politics of today,” Burguiere said. “He’s not an ideologue on this… [and] I think he is more concerned with being elected right now – that was the tone of the statement.”
Marcus believes real change on this issue will come from the states. “I think Trump’s state-by-state approach actually kind of offers an opportunity here,” he explained. “If we’re able to create a reasonable path forward [in red states], I think that has the opportunity to do a lot more to save lives and to limit abortion, then this sort of very online or very ‘on TV’ political fight.”
Ultimately, Megyn said Trump appears to be focused on the 2024 election. “He is thinking strategically,” she concluded. “And that’s what one must do in order to win elections – not just the presidency but the Senate, which controls the Supreme Court confirmations and beyond.”
You can check out Megyn’s full interview with Burguiere and Marcus by tuning in to episode 760 on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you like to listen. And don’t forget that you can catch The Megyn Kelly Show live on SiriusXM’s Triumph (channel 111) weekdays from 12pm to 2pm ET.